Thursday, August 30, 2012

I don’t know what’s gotten into this club but it seems we are hell bent on voluntarily handicapping ourselves every summer.

For the last 2 seasons, we have secured a platform for us to build on yet we get to the summer and we decide, ‘actually I don’t like the platform, let’s take a bazooka to it’. I hate to remind you all but just in the last 2 summers we have lost Fabregas, Nasri, Clichy, Song and Van Persie. That’s near enough half a team.

And yet, I’m more confident than ever that we will finish 4th next season. But that is the sad realisation there. 4th is the aim. Surely something is wrong with me, happy with us finishing 4th? Sadly yes and it will be like that for a while yet because of two things:

- the sugar bosses are here to stay. Abramovich has laughed in the face of FFP this summer which indicates to me it’s going to do nil, nada, nothing in the long run.

- Our like for the destruction of the ‘platform’

However I feel the second reason may not be so destructive next summer. In the last 6 months we have tied down the captain and the most underrated centre back in this land in Vermaelen and Koscielny. Expect to see the likes of Sagna, Gibbs and the nutty pole in goal all sign on in the next 12 months. I see no reason why they won’t. Bacary loves the club and Szczesny and Gibbs are not as highly rated outside of these walls as they are inside them. Outside of those 3, there are no players that we will miss that fall into the dreaded FINAL TWELVE MONTHS.

To quote a man who is turning into a fine pundit, Gary Neville, "Arsenal have flushed the toilet this summer." Van Persie aside, we’ve moved on a lot of shit in this summer. We have still got some floaters hanging around in Chamakh, Squillaci, Best.Ever.ndtner, Arshavin that need some gentle persuading but so far we’ve moved on 15 pieces of shi… players and Van Persie (who is a piece of shit anyway but for a different, more obvious reason).

The club is changing its approach and unfortunately, these things take time. Our new approach to the market coupled with the expectation that we won’t blow up whatever platform we build this upcoming season will finally start to see us moving forward.

So buckle up and prepare for that bumpy up and down rollercoaster to 4th. It’s not as exciting as title race but you are deluded if you think we’ll be involved in that. We’re already 7 points off 1st.